SONAR 6 Audio Snap?

[punkin]

Anyone using the Audio Snap feature in SONAR 6? From the web/video/demonstration it looks like a very nifty free-style writer's tool. Just wondering if it's as easy to use as it appears.

Also, one more quickie question...does SONAR 6 finally let you save to MP3 or other formats yet like Audition 2 or do they still make you buy their $20 encoder plug-in? Damn that's cheap of them...don't you think?

I'm getting itchy and I'm seriously thinking about steppin' up to the SONAR 6 Pro version. The version 5 Pro version is nice but it's still missing a little sumptin' sumptin' if you know what I mean.


Thanks,

[jerberson12]

Audio Snap is a pain in the ass. yeah its easy to use but tracks edited on audio snap like the quantization can be obvious. The guy on the audio snap in the demo is just too good for it. I tried audio snap in on my guitar tracks so that it will sound quantized but its horrible.

You still need to buy the MP3 encoder on Sonar 6 Pro.

Better grafix though.

[punkin]

Aaarrrgghh...that looked like the bomb for me. Other than the other plug-in's I'm not so sure it's a bargain right now.


Thanks for the heads up.

[DM1]

With repect to jerberson12, I couldn't disagree more with the "pain in the ass" comment. Especially with the 6.2 Sonar upgrade, Audiosnap is HANDS DOWN the best audio-quantizer I've ever used. I cleaned up a 6-mic'd drum kit yesterday in 5 minutes. The same thing would have taken about an hour with Beat Detective.

Also, jerberson12 may not be aware (and my apologies If I'm wrong about that): The default time-stretching algorithm that Sonar uses is great for percussion but CRAP for acoustic guitar. However, you can select from among 4 different algorithms, and the Izotop Radius one, while it's a CPU pig, is far better on musical sound sources.

[K-dub]

That's interesting, as my experiences mirror yours. I quantized a bongo sample I'd laid down in one project, and copy/pasted it into another. It worked flawlessly.

On the other hand, tightening up a rhythm guitar part was disasterous -- transparent it was NOT.

Nice to know about the ability to change the algorithms.

Kev-

[punkin]

I don't intend to stir things up here but I downloaded the demo version this weekend and played a little with it. I really get some horrible artifacting when using the audio snap thingy. I thought I would do some loosely timed guitar parts and then layer a drum loop track on top. I then went back to exersize the audio snap thing to synch up with the drum track...sounded very bad.

I'm not saying this feature isn't any good. There's probably a learning curve I'm not over yet and I'm sure there are limitations but I really didn't think I was doing anything really over the top in terms of time stretching. It might help if I had some written instructions on how to use it too.

[Freudian Slip]

Originally Posted by punkin

I don't intend to stir things up here but I downloaded the demo version this weekend and played a little with it. I really get some horrible artifacting when using the audio snap thingy. I thought I would do some loosely timed guitar parts and then layer a drum loop track on top. I then went back to exersize the audio snap thing to synch up with the drum track...sounded very bad.

I'm not saying this feature isn't any good. There's probably a learning curve I'm not over yet and I'm sure there are limitations but I really didn't think I was doing anything really over the top in terms of time stretching. It might help if I had some written instructions on how to use it too.

I have tested audiosnap several times with little success. I have had success with bass & drums but only when used to tighten them up to a click track with the tempo already set correctly. There are alot of options in the audiosnap pallet that I may not know how to use well, but It should be easier for both of us than it is

In defense I have been able to change the tempo on entire songs with no pitch change or artifacts at all. That's pretty cool. Also the editing ability of sonar it's self is just awsome I think in the few months I've had it I've managed to produce 1 click from cutting and That's with me being extremely care free with cutting an no cross fading. S6 does let the creative juices flow very well and I am super happy I bought it. (I did have to upgrade to a core 2 duo computer too)


F.S.

[punkin]

That's pretty much what I've seen. It seems to fare better with drum sounds. The more complex sounds like distorted guitar, it really seems to trash the sound. For now, I think I'll just stick with my SONAR 5 Pro.

Thanks everyone.

[Freudian Slip]

Originally Posted by punkin

That's pretty much what I've seen. It seems to fare better with drum sounds. The more complex sounds like distorted guitar, it really seems to trash the sound. For now, I think I'll just stick with my SONAR 5 Pro.

Thanks everyone.

Oh by the way, if you have sonar 5 then youcan get the mp3 encoder activation for free as long as you're registered. I got it for free cause of PA9.

Ya Audiosnap alone is not worth it. VC64 is very cool but if you have good plugs then.....

Later

F.S.

[punkin]

Originally Posted by Freudian Slip

Oh by the way, if you have sonar 5 then youcan get the mp3 encoder activation for free as long as you're registered. I got it for free cause of PA9.

Ya Audiosnap alone is not worth it. VC64 is very cool but if you have good plugs then.....

Later

F.S.

MP3 encoder for free? Where did you see that (if you don't mind)?

[Freudian Slip]

Originally Posted by punkin

MP3 encoder for free? Where did you see that (if you don't mind)?

I don't know where it says it. I was going to buy it online and their store was not working so I called customer support. They told me since I had PA9 Pro suite (which came with the ability) that I could have it for free and they emailed me the unlocker.

Check out this link though it mentions something about it in the product desctription.

http://store.cakewalk.com/b2cus/Prod...0-CWMA1.00-10E

F.S.

[punkin]

Thanks! I'll send them an email. Appreciate the candid response. I'm a sofware whore for sure but this one...I donno...unless you've missed the last few releases, it seems more like a patch and plug-in update. I'm a happy SONAR 5 user.


Thanks everyone!

[cmhansen]

They're right about the audio snap on acoustic guitar. Tried fixing some minor issues on a collab recently, and it was a disaster.

As for a MP3 encoder. My Sonar 6 Studio has the lame encoder incorporated in the program.

[K-dub]

I remembered this thread, particularly the comment about the acoustic guitar, and I had an experience I wanted to share.

I was trying to sync up two rhythm acoustic guitars that kind of had that slight out of sync l/r ping pong going in a track I'm currently working on.

I enabled Audiosnap on both and quantized in real time.

On playback, the pops, clicks and sound were HORRID -- it truly was a disaster.

I said, "CW couldn't have expected satisfaction putting out something this bad in a major feature, I must have it wrong."

So I went to the CW forum and read up.

It's true that AS sucks in real time, for in real time there are two rendering options, "Percussion" and "The other one I can't remember right now." -- but they were NEVER intended to sound good on anything but transient, percussive tracks.

On the other hand, the advice read, rendering by "Bounce to clip" results in a rather good, clean and lifelike track.

This is because there are 4 options for rendering -- from Izotope Mix and Solo rendering to a specialized ones for vocals, and another for bass.

I returned to my project and used the "Mix" setting on the acoustic ... rendering the result to a new clip. You can always "UNDO" if you don't like the result.

The results were stunning. NO artifacts whatsoever, and the guitars were strummed right on the beat as if it were originally played that way.

I'm not a CW shill, but I was totally impressed.

Just thought I'd share w/ those that hadn't yet figured out why they couldn't get good sounds out of their acoustic guitar using the effect.

Best,

Kev-


btw ... JUST like you don't want to autotune a whole vocal track, only the pitch that might wander far -- you don't want to audiosnap the whole track either. Just cut a clip out of the errant part, and do things in small bites. I just thought I'd add that, as my first attempts tried to incorporate too large a piece, and Sonar froze twice. K-

[Freudian Slip]

Thanks K-dub

Good to know.

I had some success doing sections of a bass track in real time with AS, but when I mixed down the timing of some of the clips whent wacky.
I was just reading last night that the 6.02 patch is supposed to fix that.
I will have to see what version I am on.

Next time I have an issue that AS might work on I will try the method you described.


Thanks again for the info.

F.S.

[dirtythermos]

I wish I'd seen this thread a month ago. I spent the last couple weeks discovering the different rendering algorithms for myself.

I would like to point out that you can Freeze a track and it will render it with the offline AS algorithm - I like this better than Bounce to Clip because I don't have to commit forever. I can Unfreeze the track later and tweak it some more.

I wrote up my learning experience on my blog, if anyone's interested. There's some audio clips from a real project I'm working on.

[punkin]

subtle improvements but still, very nice. Great blog BTW.

I'm still trying to "get" the whole freeze function. I see that you can use it on synth tracks as well. From what I gather, it's supposed to help from loading up your cpu. Maybe I'm fortunate and have enough machine and can't "appreciate" the feature yet.

Don't suppose you have an explanation for the Freeze thing do you?

[Freudian Slip]

Originally Posted by punkin

subtle improvements but still, very nice. Great blog BTW.

I'm still trying to "get" the whole freeze function. I see that you can use it on synth tracks as well. From what I gather, it's supposed to help from loading up your cpu. Maybe I'm fortunate and have enough machine and can't "appreciate" the feature yet.

Don't suppose you have an explanation for the Freeze thing do you?

It basicly applies all effects & eq to the track temporarily. The nice thing about it is that you can save a project and close sonar, open sonar back up, unfreeze the track and make adjustments. The fader stays ajustable while the track is frozen, but that's about it.
I don't use it much, but I will use it when I am really happy with a track just to lock it down so I don't mess it up on accient.

F.S.

[dirtythermos]

Originally Posted by punkin

I'm still trying to "get" the whole freeze function. I see that you can use it on synth tracks as well. From what I gather, it's supposed to help from loading up your cpu. Maybe I'm fortunate and have enough machine and can't "appreciate" the feature yet.

Yeah, I think that's what it's mostly used for - freeing up CPU resources by doing sort of a mini-mixdown. I've never run out of CPU either. But, for the high-quality audiosnap algorithms, it lets you get them into a project you're still working on without having to commit like you do with Bounce To Clip.

For synths, I guess if you had a cpu/memory intensive softsynth, you could freeze the track so you weren't using that cpu while recording other instruments.

[Freudian Slip]

Originally Posted by dirtythermos

Yeah, I think that's what it's mostly used for - freeing up CPU resources by doing sort of a mini-mixdown. I've never run out of CPU either. But, for the high-quality audiosnap algorithms, it lets you get them into a project you're still working on without having to commit like you do with Bounce To Clip.

For synths, I guess if you had a cpu/memory intensive softsynth, you could freeze the track so you weren't using that cpu while recording other instruments.

that is a good feature using the freeze fubnction to render audio snap for testing purposes.

Thanks for the tip.

F.S.